


The Interloper

by Iczhihal



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-20
Updated: 2014-05-20
Packaged: 2018-01-25 20:11:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1661009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iczhihal/pseuds/Iczhihal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Execution day draws viewers, but the execution of Prince Loki brings the whole of the realm. Let the people see, he insists, why the Prince is being put to death. In his final hour, the trickster tells the truth and for the first and last time, he's believed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Interloper

**Author's Note:**

  * For [](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts).



> Well, I had a re-introduction to Camus' The Stranger, which for some reason prompted me to write this. First post here on a03. (Please tell me if something is messed up.)  
> Dedicated to Nat because she's the one person I can be sure will always read my work.

The blank look plastered across his face looked almost serene. Loki tried to keep stride as the guards pushed and prodded at him to keep moving, but walking proved difficult with shackles, even more so with broken bones not yet healed.  
"It is quite a nice day, is it not?" He spoke to the guard. A grunt was the only response, guard turning his head slightly to glare at the prisoner.  
"I suppose it is a good day for an execution. It should draw a crowd." This time he received a shove that almost pushed him to he ground. How rude.

"Shut up and walk, scum." Loki took the suggestion.

It felt as if he was a foreigner, being paraded down the street of Asgard to the center square. He had expected there to be an arrival by Odin Allfather, but for some reason the king was already present. He sat in a throne similar to the other, but not quite. Loki dabbled on the thought of Thor not being present. With any luck the golden child was on Midgard, and would be completely unawares of his 'brother' being executed.

The square was far from empty. In fact, Loki could safely guess that the entire population of Asgard was there. Even children ran between the masses of people, climbing trees and clambering up on the walls with their friends in an effort to see if anything eventful was occurring. It was a depressing feeling, the thought that as he walked to his death, not a single person would mourn his passing other than his mother and ‘brother’. Possibly the nice servant girl Loki had, she might be sad for his passing. Or the healer Sigyn who he almost always visited after he’d been dragged into fights. No, most likely not her. Most likely only the girl, Syra. She was nice, Loki had talked to her when possible. She was generally educated, and appreciated what he himself did. He supposed that her parents had either died or sold her into servitude after not being able to marry her off, a pity since in Loki’s opinion she was rather attractive. It was most likely her knowledge and smart mouth that was her downfall. Another pity, Loki found her to be a good companion to talk to.

He was so deep in thought that when the guard yanked his chain to face the crowd instead of Odin Allfather, he stumbled. The noose was fitted around his neck, Loki scrunching up his face as the guards came just a hair too close with their foul breath. They unlocked the long chains that kept him bound, leaving the shackles and cuffs for their own safety. How silly, as if he could run now. A deep silence fell over the crowd as Odin stood.

Gungnir was slammed into the stone by Odin’s feet, sparks flying. The sound rebounded off the city walls and Loki recoiled as his ears rung from the harsh sound.

“Today in the month of Ýlir we have assembled for the sentence of Loki.” Odin’s voice carried across the crowd. “ The high courts have determined that the sentence of his actions will be punished through death by being hanged. As one can see, the hanging of Prince Loki of Asgard will be genuine and will occur in a timely fashion. Now..” He turned to the younger son. “Does Prince Loki have final words before the execution today?”

Loki couldn’t stop the sneer as he breathed out laughter. “ _Prince_ Loki? Of _Asgard_? Why not address me as I should be? It’s quite inconsiderate that at my final hour I am still being lied to.”

“You are Prince Loki of Asgard and will be addressed as such.”

“No! Not at all. Why do you speak with such… upheld standard? Can you not see me as I am?” Loki’s outline shimmered and he dropped the image of alabaster skin and unbroken complexion. A few startled gasps were revealed as Loki opened his scarred eyes, chemical burns making his irises impossible to see. White scar tissue webbed his face and neck, and scars that looked like piercings gone wrong dotted his lips. “Can you not see what you have done to my skin? I know I am at the end of my rope but can you at least not see me as I am?”

“Loki, today we execute you no matter how you wish to be addressed. Today we hang Loki of Asgard as that is who you are.” He sat down in an action of finality.

Loki snapped back at the comment.

"Today you execute a monster, not a prince of Asgard, as I never truly was.” He laughed. “Actually, prince wasn’t incorrect, you just got the realm wrong. Thank you Odin, for in giving me death you are in fact, fulfilling the only thing I have ever wanted besides an approval of me." The heavy ropes itched as they lay around his neck. He wanted to reach up and scratch them, but that would destroy his image most likely. It would all be over soon anyways, why fight it?

“So, in actuality, today is the day that Prince Loki Laufeyson is hanged.”

It was stupid really, that he had to go through all this trouble to dispose of himself. But, if he had done it himself, it would have appeared cowardly and smeared his name in a way he never wished for. In having the public believe his actions as they were presented, he was not cowardly nor was he seen as a product of anything but his own actions.

He paused and turned to the executioner. "Well? What are you waiting for, pull the handle!"

The executioner made no move to fulfil the request, the streets deathly silent. Loki grew more impatient. “I said pull the lever! How are you the royal executioner, such that he cannot even rid Asgard of a single, lowly beast such as myself!"

"Loki Odinson you are to remain silent, your final words are up. Do not harass the executioner." Gungir was slammed down on the stone again. It was quite noisome and annoying, why did he keep doing that? It wasn’t a judge’s gavel.

"Oh you wouldn't call me that if you cared enough to show _what_ I am." he sneered. “I am born Loki Laufeyson and shall die Loki Laufeyson.”

Odin raised his voice against his youngest son. “Know your place. Do not act, you have already condemned yourself to your fate.”

“If I have already condemned myself, then what’s the harm?” He rolled his shoulders, working out a kink. The weights on his body from the shackles were irritating, but nothing compared through what he had suffered multiple times. It was pointless to rid himself of them as well, not as if he could. It was rather hard to see when he had to look through scarred eyes.

“The harm is labelling yourself as a disgrace to Asgard, not only a traitor.” Odin slowly rose from his throne once more, a small gasp rifling through the crowd at the action. Once the king sat, he sat until the crowds dissipated and the hanging was completed. There was no other precedent. “Do not act upon this impulse Loki. Save yourself this.”

A small bubble of laughter rose through the younger’s throat. “Save myself this? I daresay you mean save YOURSELF from this. Why not? I am to be executed so why should I hide anything? The crowds of Asgard must have want to know. I certainly had want to know. Instead let me ask them.” He turned from Odin to address the mass of people.

“Oh citizens of Asgard!” He bellowed. “Before I am to be hanged would it not be fitting to reveal the largest truth the liar of Asgard has to offer?”

The sound that resounded back felt deafening. It wasn’t a response so much as a surge of noise in approval.

Loki smirked. “Oh Odin, I fear that in the name of pleasing the constituents, I _must_ appease the people.”

A small mark of fear flickered through Odin’s gaze as his son turned to the people once more.

“Now!” It was never known that the youngest prince, the one so usually silent, could yell so loudly, Asgardians would later note. “The largest, most poisonous secret that Asgard and I have to offer presented before you now... is I myself.” And the pale façade fell.

It was satisfying, to say the least. In a single second Odin's carefully built lie by omission broke like a kite string in a storm. At the sight of marred indigo skin and candy-apple red eyes, screams filled the air. Yells of 'frost giant' and 'blueskin" were heard, "monster" being the loudest.   
The sheer intensity struck pangs of fear in the jotun’s heart that if he could admit, hurt more than they should.

Loki wanted to say that it didn't affect him, but that would be an actual lie. It stung at the edges of his eyes and in his throat, eyes becoming watery.  

"Do you not hear them? Do you hear the people?"  Yet Odin remained impassive.

"Do you think the same as they do?" The crowd fell to silence. "Because I do!" He screamed. He wanted to march up to Odin and shake him down until he understood but the noose and cuffs held him back. "I believe it! I have lived for many, many years and never have I ever felt I was anything above sub-par. I wondered why I was always treated differently, as if I was never more than expendable. But I now know why. You never understand my point of view, but Odin, dearest father I have always felt a monster of another's doing but in finding the truth..." His heart caught in his throat, a final sad laugh escaping. "Until that fateful revelation, it all drove me mad. It drove me into an insanity because of being in this golden city, where I never was the same, all because I could never escape my own skin. I was NEVER more than a stolen prize, a hyena dressed as a lion and told how savage they were. I. Went. Mad."

The executioner tightened his grip on the lever that would send the prince to death.

"Would you please pull the lever?” The reversal in tone he exhibited was mildly worrying. Seething anger to sickeningly patronizing was a shift that sat in no one’s stomach well. “ I believe it is time to discover whether Jotuns can die by hanging." A final glance towards Odin was Loki's last hope. Would allfather see him once and for all, would he give him another chance? Or would he follow Loki's wishes? If it could be more than one of the three, a blessing had come. None was Loki’s luck.

“Well? Are you going to do your job or _not_?” His voice rose in octave as he shouted at the executioner. “You were paid to put me to death so do it, you coward!” He yelled, eyes snapping open to glare, bloody red, at the stoic man. His hands trembled on the lever under leather gloves however.

Loki snarled at the silence once again. “You are all such _cowards_!”  The crazed smile spread on his face yet it didn’t reach his eyes and he screeched at his father. “I’LL SEE YOU IN HELL ODIN ALLFATHER. _I’LL SEE YOU IN HELL_ -”

The _thwap_ of the trapdoor cut off his words and the noose cut off his breath, face one of shock that someone had finally listened to him. How ironic yet fitting. Don’t fight it, it only makes it worse.   
He composed himself as tears leaked unwillingly out of his eyes. He would die with a look of peace, he would die honestly, he would die with a composed look and he would die, yet live as a story that parents tell their children at night. He would die as himself, with no friends, with no family.

Surrounded by the man who called himself father, by his mother and brother and every citizen of Asgard, Loki died alone.

His eyes slipped shut, and all was quiet in Asgard.


End file.
